“I keep six
honest serving-men (They taught me all I knew); Their names are
What and Why and When And How and Where and Who.” – Rudyard Kipling

Know Why

Start a business when you have a
passion for something and want to create something that you can
be proud of. Inspire your people with a clear vision. Define
shared values and let values rule. Build your distinctive
corporate capabilities to achieve competitive advantage.

Know What

Finding the right balance in your
business will help you refine your goals and hasten you towards
them. Organizations prosper by achieving strategy through
balancing the four major factors or perspectives: Financial;
Customer; Process; and Growth.

Know Where

Remember the old joke about the car
mechanic who’s called in after every other mechanic failed? He
listens to the engine for a few minutes, then hauls off and
gives it a big swift kick in a certain strategic spot. Lo and
behold, the engine starts humming like a kitten. The mechanic
turns around, gives the car owner his bill for $400 and the
price breakdown: '$1 for my time, and $399 for knowing where to
kick.’

Know When

Timing is everything. You have to
know not only how to make a move, but when. “The value of
actions lies in their timing,” said Lao Tzu. Customer value
derives from timely delivery. Change is unavoidable, but if you
can anticipate it and understand business cycles, you can ride
with change instead of being run over.

Know Who

"In the end, all management can be
reduced to three words: people, product, and profits. People
come first," said Lee Iacocca Your corporate vision is
worthless, strategies powerless and shared values are corrupt
without the right people to execute.

Know How

Manage processes, not people. Focus
not on what they do, but on how they do it. Establish a
synergistic enterprise-wide and an end-to-end
(cross-departmental, and often, cross-company) coordination of
work activities that create and deliver ultimate value to
customers.